Review Roundup: THE 25TH ANNUAL PUTNAM COUNTY SPELLING BEE at Donmar Warehouse

Only those blessed with an extraordinary ability and love of language qualify for the Putnam County Spelling Bee. But there can only be one winner and with a place in the national final at stake, emotions run high, hopes are quashed and dreams are broken. The show at the Donmar Warehouse now through April 2. The production features direction by Jamie Lloyd. 

The Twenty-Fifth Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee is a one act musical comedy conceived by Rebecca Feldman with music and lyrics by William Finn, a book by Rachel Sheinkin and additional material by Jay Reiss. The show centers around a fictional spelling bee set in a geographically ambiguous Putnam Valley Middle School. Six quirky adolescents compete in the Bee, run by three equally-quirky grown-ups.

Henry Hitchings, Evening Standard: The action could do with some trimming. Moreover, the tunes are pleasing without being genuinely catchy. Finn is a humane and witty composer, but his vibrancy doesn't strike me as especially personal.

Michael Billington, The Guardian: In a heavily American show, that assumes we know the difference between the Red Sox and the Yankees, it seems implausible for a high school kid to tell us that "Nick Clegg is after the alternative vote – but what about the straights?" The best one can say is that the cast in Jamie Lloyd's production works with unremitting energy.

Michael Coveney, Whatsonstage: Finn’s score, endlessly inventive and mordantly intriguing, with great use of shifting rhythms, has several great break-out moments, and Jesus himself puts in an appearance to confirm that he deals in more important matters than spelling; suitably enough, the competition is then won with  “weltenschaung.” I loved every minute, and there’s also a top-notch five-piece band under the musical direction o Alan Williams

Matt Wolf, The Arts Desk:  Far more appealing are the alternately swoony and satiric riffs of Finn's score, not least a number, "Life Is Pandemonium", that finds a stage full of school kids rocking out Spring Awakening-style, and the bespectacled deadpan proffered throughout by the priceless Pemberton. His deployment of the various words in need of spelling across a slew of sentences leaves a smile on one's face even when this latest analysis of the price paid by society's win/lose culture has begun to pall.

 

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